Life and death in the fake news business

I wrote this piece based on my knowledge of mainstream reporters and their work, their lives, their forgotten hopes, their realizations (in some cases) that they’re trapped in a system.

Most of them don’t want to get out. They become creatures of the night they once wanted to illuminate.

You’re a mainstream reporter striving to stay afloat. The word has drifted down from the top that this is the season for inflicting wounds on Donald Trump, no matter what, no matter what happened or didn’t happen on a rumpled bed in a hotel room in Moscow, no matter what Putin did or didn’t do to influence the election, no matter who leaked the DNC emails to WikiLeaks, no matter what Michael Flynn said or didn’t say to a Russian on the phone, no matter who or what James Comey is fronting for; every real or possible or non-existent detail needs to be blown up into a gigantic scandal of the moment, this president has to go, and your assignment is to keep cutting him, it’s beyond the point where anybody in your business cares who he is and what he’s done and what he’s doing, so pump up the hysteria, shove in the blade wherever you can, THIS is how your success will be measured, you want a light to shine on you, so attack, attack without let-up, don’t think, don’t think about what’s going on here, the important thing is:

The news business is: careers.

Having a career is life. Losing it is death.

Your career is on the line.

It doesn’t matter what you’ve done over the years, what you’ve written, what you’ve said, this is the big one.

You can’t lose your career.

You know what losing it means.

It means the end.

Losing your career is hanging around a bar until closing time and silently cursing the boss and the other reporters who are climbing faster up the ladder, it’s worrying about where the next story is coming from and how it can zing the editor’s brain so he grunts with satisfaction like an ape on a little throne, it’s all the while knowing that NO ONE at the newspaper or the network can put out a piece that will cause serious ripples in the behind-the-curtain power structure, and you know that because in the past, in what was supposed to be your finest hour, you carefully peeled just one glove from the body of a scandal that should have been stripped entirely naked for the public to see and then you were stopped; suddenly, for you, losing a career is desperately clinging to the biased political stance of the news division, clinging to it as if it were a message from God, it’s taking a piece of info that smells like a rotten slug from an anonymous source and turning it into caviar because it decorates a story that has no foundation whatsoever, it’s pruriently hinting in a story that the enemy, as defined by the editorial staff and the publisher and the corporation that owns the soul of the publisher, is a despicable traitor who should be carted off in the middle of the night and dumped on a boat to the 10th circle of Hell, it’s being wired into who at the news division is moving up and who is moving down, who is the teacher’s pet and who is the bad boy at the back of the room, it’s scouting out jobs that are coming up at rival networks, it’s knowing when dreaded staff layoffs are emerging over the horizon and how flimsy the severance packages will be, it’s grinding on preposterous assignments that have no function other than filling space, it’s pretending one political party or another will stave off the end of civilization, it’s your paycheck that handles the mortgage and the kid’s college fund although how does the kid get into college when he can’t even write a coherent paragraph unless he plagiarizes it from Wikipedia, it’s finally getting your teeth into a good story only to be told there’ll be no follow-up and you know exactly why because you know which person or corporation or advertiser would be rammed into handcuffs if you dug down a foot deeper, it’s forgetting you were once smart and sharp and alert and ready to roll as a member of the fourth estate on a mission to protect the public from the raging excesses of government, it’s sitting for a half-hour with a Congressman and listening to him lie so extensively you can’t believe he knows he’s lying anymore because if he did know, how could he consciously keep up the charade every waking moment, it’s looking at THE elite anchor of your network and knowing he’s a complete cartoon of an ego on parade, it’s wondering how the public even in the depths of its trance can believe what is coming out of the mouth of that ego, it’s lying in bed at night not recalling whether you took a sleeping pill, it’s tearing the cap off a bottle of antidepressant with shaking fingers after coming out of the drug store where you filled the prescription and swallowing a pill and three hours later sitting in your work-cubbyhole thinking with great and rising surety that you want to burn down the newsroom, it’s standing in the kitchen of your silent apartment remembering you wrote a paper in college about the 1776 revolution although you can’t bring back one word of it now, it’s rubbing elbows with celebrities at a cocktail party on the Upper East Side and sensing a few B-listers are giving you a quick once-over to gauge whether you can do them any good and deciding you can’t, it’s having a dream you’re drowning in your bathtub and your editor is standing above you grinning with pistols in his hands, it’s sitting in the antiseptic office of a therapist who is telling you that getting a dog as a friend will rescue your state of mind, it’s standing in the newsroom on election night watching so-called analysts on big screens talking numbers and trends and possible outcomes and you’re thinking you’re supposed to be on the screen yourself but it hasn’t worked out that way, it’s wondering whether selling Porches or hawking real estate would be a better option at this point, it’s wondering by what method you would commit the oh so grand gesture of suicide, because it should be grand, it should have some significance in the scheme of things, it can’t be a mere disappearance, can it, there would at least be a need for some sort of plan, would it be gun or slit wrist or rope or leap—and then you laugh—AND WHY DOES IT SOUND LIKE MUSIC—and then, THEN you recall that in your desk drawer there is a fat folder full of documents proving a major prime-cut number one advertiser for your newspaper, a major advertiser and a colossus apparently beyond the reach of any president with its far-flung global interests in brain-crippling pharmaceuticals and carcinogenic pesticides and real estate and banking is also—and how perfect is THIS—is also a giant HOG-RAISING FACTORY (millions and millions of oinking pigs) that has polluted the soil of half a southern state with hundreds of toxic chemicals and untold numbers and types of germs and the corporation has bribed its way into permission to create gigantic hog-feces lagoons that sit out in the sunlight year after year festering and percolating and seeping down into the groundwater and poisoning every form of life, and you sit there and nod to yourself and open the drawer and take out that fat folder of documents and you find a piece of blank paper and without thinking you write a brief note of resignation to your ape editor and you stand up and walk out of the newsroom carrying the folder and you hit the night street and walk along with the surging crowds and you feel your blood coursing through your veins and you realize there are a few tears on your cheeks and you grin a savage grin and head home to write the story that will rip that hog-colossus a deep wound and you look up at the moon and a shiver goes through your body, it’s almost midnight but it’s not your midnight, all of a sudden a cockeyed sun is coming up for you between big buildings and through some strange unfathomable equation you’re hitting your stride because you just lost your career and a new and unnameable SPACE is swimming into view, and you’re already writing the first paragraph of the REAL story and THIS is the drama you were imagining so long ago, so long ago when you believed in working a real beat as a real newsman…

The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free NoMoreFakeNews emails here or his free OutsideTheRealityMachine emails here.

26 comments on “Life and death in the fake news business”

Having trouble posting your link on FB. Says it doesn’t meet community standards. I was asked if it was spam. I clicked no it was not. Trying for a workaround. Keep up the good work, Jon. Plenty of us out there doing the same work. You’re not alone in this. https://www.facebook.com/appliedspirituality

………, AND the BIGGEST RUSE of all, Zionist/Actor Alex Jones and the “convenient” attack on him, at a time when virtually; all media , including the so -called ALT Media, and politicians want to stop people from QUESTIONING, Criticizing and/or EXPOSING Israel and those Ashkenazi FAKE KHAZER-converted Jews in Israel.

Think of the MILLIONS of DOLLARS of PUBLICITY ,Alex Jones is receiving. I was in Promotion and Advertising in the 1960’S and we KNEW that ANY kind of Publicity, manipulated, properly is GREAT NEWS for the TARGET

Laws will inevitably be enacted making it “illegal” to talk TRUTH about Israel; and/or Jews, just as exist now in Britain and Germany et al.

When the FOG clears, “INFOWARS” will be the one of the very few left standing along with the MSM, of course, BECAUSE he and they NEVER QUESTION or Criticize Israel along with those Zionist Mafia Thugs in the U.S. Government and Israel, whereas many of the ALT MEDIA do.

Those new laws will, in effect, destroy most Alt Media, making less competition for Alex Jones, MSM and company, creating another Criminal ZIONIST BILLIONAIRE.

THAT is the point of the mosquito-type ATTACK on Alex Jones and HE and TRUMP KNOW it…………

……….and YES, Trump is part of this so-typical Zionist tactic, to control the NARRATIVE and Americans, the ZOMBIES,they have become, will CLAP. for their Hero and Savior……The Bible says its so 🙂 .

Quebec. Dear God, just ignore this paid troll. This person even created a back story to provide the guise as authentic. It feeds off us responding. Hell, I fell for it at first. Just ignore it and it will go away or Jon will finally notice the nasty rhetoric and vitriol and hopefully respond in an appropriate manner.

Seriously though, we ought to just ignore it. Less money to COINTELPRO, less money for dissent and disruption.

Well, it is old news about book banning leading to big sales. For anyone interested in tricks of the trade, see Robert Cialdini’s “Influence”. Cialdini is for people preventing the improper, predatory uses of influence.

“I was in Promotion and Advertising in the 1960’s and we Knew that Any kind of Publicity, manipulated […]”

Listen spit, you’re loosing me in these little stories you’re telling me — first you were a school teacher, now you were in advertising. Was this before or after your sex change operation? Was your alcoholism as bad then?

I mean c’mon Free Spritzer, seriously — next you’re going to tell me you were a policeman or a cowboy, or a construction worker or an airline pilot. Your not one of the “Village People” are you — I hated disco music. You’re not gay are you Free. God I hope not, just when I found a new friend too, aw well if your gay, your gay, it is, what it is, is what I always say…

It must be awful, for you Spit. Your gay and peckerless and really fuckin old, can’t get into your old “Village People” outfits anymore. It’s sad Free *sniff* s’cuse me…just a little water.

From your writing Spit — I see normal, well, close to normal like sentence structure, and then a capitalized word. Sounds to me, like your voice goes up and your yelling at that capitalized word. Do you (hope ya don’t mind me asking ) have Tourette’s syndrome. I am very astute at these things Freester.

Now this Fog you’re talking about…do you get it alot…is it foggy most time Spit, because that would also explain a lot more? I have been doing my psychology courses on-line, for my online certificate. It’s an eight week course and I’m almost finished. Then I am going to set up office and straighten out these crazy ungendereded kids — we have taking about fogginess lately, so I know about this stuff.

I looked twice buddy, I swear, and I could not find Trump’s name, or the words Zombie or even Americans and the Clap or any of that other stuff in the Bible. What Bible are using, I stole mind years ago from a Marriott Hotel. Maybe it’s old and out of date. Is yours the revised one?

I am all frazzled now a bit Free, listen up Spitster. It ok, you can tell me, I’m a good listener…and I don’t judge, but it would clear up a lot for me…Oh I’m just going to say it — Spit are you an old gay mental patient that is disgruntled cause you had your pecker cut off — did you jump the fence? Are you AWOL buddy? Have you been off your medication for a few days — and I think there’s a bit of Parkinson’s there to as you cant remember what job you did in the old days. That ok spooky, we all have a tiny little bit of trouble remembering stuff — not like you! But hey, live and let live is what I always say.

– The court’s findings absolved the Trump organization of financial responsibility to the 6,000 plaintiffs who claimed to have been defrauded by his for-profit education venture. It also dismantled the claims of fraud, breach of contract, negligent misrepresentation, and bad faith that had previously been levied against the Trump company in a U.S. District Court for Southern California.

“Of course I was treated very unfairly. The fake news and the failing New York Times said terrible things about the Trump schools, but most of the smartest business people in the world that I know all went there and I’ve been there many times. So, you tell me. But now we finally got it right. The judges finally got something right. It doesn’t happen a lot. Believe me.”

– Trump pledged that the university would begin by reopening 47 locations nationwide before the start of fall semester 2018. “It’ll be easy,” Trump boasted. “We never actually cleaned out the classrooms in the first place.”

unfettered fire says: “Insanely good writing, Jon!” WHY? I think Jon would approve of my question as you have approved of his writing? HOW does Jon Rappoport LIVE his life? Actions, not words are powerful. unfettered fire – explain to me on this blog of Jon’s writing is “insanely good”. WHY you “think” it is insane and good at the same time. I’m quite sure I will never hear the answer. There are no answers. There are only questions. Let us figure out how to live our lives!

I think msm journalists have totally sold their soul to the devil and thus no thinking or creativity is needed at this point. Here’s a chart how it works: Rogue CIA MSM Brainwashing System Discovered. Here’s How it Works All Over the World.

Jon I think this one is a home-run of an article that describes the trap people are in. Career = Life.

The Big are running the show. Not many places to run to get away from them. Start your own business ? I bet today it is near impossible.

Someone told me that the microbreweries that were taking business away from the big “piss water” corporations are being bought up by the Big Breweries. No place for the little guy on the shelves in the stores.

You wouldn’t believe what is involved just to make alcohol to sell, especially spirits. Cannabis? Forget about it.
You want to start a business? Clean houses or become a consultant. Even those are regulated if you want to get serious.

Anyone who thinks America is capitalist has either no knowledge of capitalism or is a liar. This is a highly centralized, suffocatingly regulated economy and it will not relinquish it’s ability to use violence.

Make no mistake, this is mafioso, except it has that added benefit of 15,000 hours of indoctrination to train children to obey the state and love it like it is their God. I meet less than one on two hundred that are voluntaryist and truly understand it

There is not one square inch of American soil free from the external restraint and violence of the American government. You don’t own property, your rent it. We are enslaved because we don’t own 100% of our labor. Although abundant, cheap energy had created amazing comforts and excess, the consequence has been apathy and lethargy. The true grit of what made this nation has been systematically brainwashed out of the public through state “education” and “free press”, while the progenitors of this system, after having raped everyone while it was still real capitalism, have instituted significant restrictions free trade and individual freedom. Each successive generation, having not been educated in the Trivium, grew more and more dependent on Mommy and Daddy state, and slowly replaced an all powerful creator an arbitrary oligarchy/fascist conglomeration.

It is absolutely sickening to have no recourse to live freely and trade in good faith without jumping through impossible hoops and excessive taxation, fees, and permitting.
This is not America

Trump met with Putin at the Kremlin and had an ice cold Diet Coke. Famed Russian pimp Yuri Nator supplied fine ass hookers Katia Cherkonov and Ivanna Mantolov.
It must be etched on a stone tablet because I saw it on teevee. Bankers and lawyers must loves the presstitutes for taking off some of the heat.